Tablet computers

With a large number of albums and tracks of folk dance music now available for purchase
as ".mp3" files, a means of using these for folk dancing is required. The obvious choice of
an MP3-player does not work at all well. The size and controls on these players, even those with
a touch-sensitive screen, tend to be very small. You need to be dexterous and careful to manipulate
one of these devices while calling. Instead I use a tablet computer with an 8"
touch-sensitive screen as a large-screen MP3-player.

The most widely known of such devices are probably:

Apple iPad Mini

Google Nexus 7

Neither of the above tablets allow
external storage to be inserted. This means when the device dies, which it will as the rechargable
batteries can not be replaced, then music and any other data is lost or at best has to be
downloaded/installed again. Both
Apple and Google charge significantly more for versions of these devices that have increased internal
storage. Devices from several other manufacturers have a slot to insert a
micro-SDHC card. This means the whole collection of music, images, and so on can be removed for
transfer to or from another device, including a PC.

I have used two such tablet computers. Both run under the Anroid operating system
which is produced by Google and is based on the Linux operating system.

The picture on the
above right shows this on an
Arkon fold-up stand (an excellent
piece of kit) with the tablet's headphone output connected to the stereo input sockets of the
Fender Passport PD150+ amplifier.

This tablet runs Version 4.0 of the Android operating system; this version is also known
as Ice Cream Sandwich or ICS.